The Japanese government has allowed residents of two more districts near the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant to return. (NHK)

Aoi Hoshi and Eita Sato, age 15, are the only students left at Yumoto Junior High School in Japan's remote mountain village of Ten-ei, in Fukushima Prefecture. (Reuters)

Japanese prosecutors have charged three former members of the Ground Self-Defense Force with indecent assault of a female colleague, reversing a previous decision not to indict them. (NHK)

Japanese novelist Kenzaburo Oe, winner of the 1994 Nobel Prize in Literature who was also known as a campaigner for the pacifist Constitution and against nuclear power, has died of old age, publisher Kodansha said Monday. He was 88. (Nikkei)

More than 30,000 Japanese remain displaced after a major earthquake and tsunami struck northeastern Japan 12 years ago on Saturday, even as some of the worst affected areas reopen to former residents. (Nikkei)

Japanese weather officials have issued heavy snow warnings for suburban Tokyo and other prefectures. They are warning of more possible disruptions to road traffic and public transport. (NHK)

On a quiet day at work around 10 years ago, Tadanori Fukushima started receiving alarming email messages from a sender he did not recognize. The emails warned that his company's broadcasting satellite -- worth roughly $150 million -- was on a collision course with an unidentified object. The sender turned out to be the U.S. Air Force. (Nikkei)

A former worker at a host club in Tokyo's Kabukicho nightlife district has been arrested on suspicion of coercing a female customer into prostitution so she could pay off her bills, police said Monday. (Kyodo)

A Japanese court on Wednesday found three former utility company executives not guilty of negligence over the 2011 Fukushima nuclear power plant disaster and the subsequent deaths of more than 40 elderly residents during their forced evacuation. (staradvertiser.com)

Japan has put on hold the release to the sea of treated but still radioactive wastewater from the Fukushima nuclear power plant after factoring in the progress of a single-purpose tunnel and the need to gain public support. (The Daily News)

Japan on Thursday set out a new decarbonization policy with a lasting role for nuclear power, allowing the rebuilding of aging reactors in a reversal of the phase-out plan adopted after the Fukushima disaster more than a decade ago. (Nikkei)

Record snowfalls for a 24-hour period have been observed in Fukushima Prefecture, northeastern Japan, and Niigata Prefecture, on the Sea of Japan coast. (NHK)

Japan's military on Thursday fired five servicemen and punished four others in a sexual assault case brought by a former soldier, prompting a rare investigation across the Defense Ministry that found more than 100 other complaints of harassment, officials said. (CNA)

A 97-year-old man driving a passenger car in Fukushima City on Saturday afternoon hit a woman in her 40s who was walking on the sidewalk before collided into another car, killing the pedestrian and injuring 3 other people. (Fuji News Network)

For almost three years, Japan was closed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Luckily, the wait is over. Now the country welcomes vaccinated visitors from all over the world without any need to quarantine or do PCR tests. (newsonjapan.com)

A 28-year-old man who was arrested on suspicion of killing his 54-year-old adoptive mother last year has died after being found unresponsive in his detention cell in Osaka, authorities said Friday. (Japan Today)

Japan will restart more idled nuclear plants and look at developing next-generation reactors, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said on Wednesday, setting the stage for a major policy shift on nuclear energy a decade after the Fukushima disaster. (Reuters)

Police in Annaka, Gunma Prefecture, have arrested a 29-year-old unemployed man on suspicion of abusing his former girlfriend’s four-year-old son by sticking sewing needles into his buttocks. (Japan Today)

As Japan faces a myriad of challenges from the coronavirus to an increasingly complex security landscape, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has packed his cabinet with seasoned lawmakers who he hopes can tackle them head-on. (Nikkei)

Japan's Meteorological Agency has issued an emergency heavy rain warning for Niigata Prefecture, next to Yamagata Prefecture, where the same warning was issued on Wednesday night. It's a level 5 alert, the highest on the emergency scale. (NHK)

The average life expectancy of Japanese women and men decreased for the first time in a decade in 2021 as the country struggled with the COVID-19 pandemic, health ministry's statistics showed Friday. (Xinhua)

Japan's nuclear regulator on Friday (Jul 22) formally approved a plan to release more than a million tonnes of treated water from the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant into the ocean. (CNA)

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said he ordered as many as nine nuclear reactors to be restarted to help ease concerns about a possible power crunch. (alarabiya.net)

A Tokyo court on Wednesday ordered former executives of Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. to pay the utility some 13 trillion yen ($95 billion) in total damages for failing to prevent the 2011 crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. (Nikkei)

Japan is in the midst of its hottest early summer on record, with June temperatures breaking through 40C last week. (BBC)